Still, embarrassment was the least of my concerns. I was also irritated at myself because quarantine stress be damned, I was too old to be coping by eating my way straight to a number two. That’s amateur hour. But mostly, I was annoyed. Why, at one of my lowest moments, did my boyfriend have pitch-perfect hearing? Do you know the number of times in our relationship when BB’s eyes have glazed over while I’m talking to him and he cannot repeat back to me what I just said? Countless. But all of a sudden while he’s watching an episode of Peaky fucking Blinders,* he has the hearing of a Labrador retriever vibing out to an instrumental track of Mariah Carey’s dog whistles? Oh, hell no! So out of spite, I denied what he heard and suspected, cleaned myself up, and—oh, you know how the evening ended.
Fast-forward to three weeks later. Save for a couple of well-timed jokes from British Baekoff, Poopgate was behind us. We were too busy getting the hang of our newfound rhythm after overcoming the growing pains of coronavirus-induced, 24/7 immersion therapy aka quarantining. So at the end of a particularly good day, we chilled in bed. He scrolled his phone while I rested my head on his chest and enjoyed the rise and fall of his upper body as he breathed. It was one of those blissfully peaceful moments that I wanted to file away in my mind for later. Then I started cackling, which made Bae ask me what was so funny. Every time I tried to explain, no words got out, only more giggling.
Eventually, I managed to get out, “So you remember that night when you asked if I had shit myself?”
I felt him put his phone down on the bed. “Yeah . . .”
“Well, you were right, but I didn’t want to admit it. And I’ve been walking around these past three weeks dying to tell you because we tell each other everything. So, yep, I crapped my pants. There. I said it.” Then I did that thing that Black people do when they are amazed by street magic: I ran away while laughing.
Baekoff gleefully yelled, “I knew it! I knew it! I knew you shit yourself!”
I came back in the bedroom and the two of us tried and failed to talk through our cackling. Hands down, this is one of my favorite memories from the Quarantimes, which is surprising for the obvious reason (deucing oneself is universally considered a lowlight) and not-so-obvious reason (owning up to said deucing brought my boyfriend and me closer). Actually, I’ll take it a step further: Pandemic and devastating social and racial uprisings aside, quarantining was one of the best things that happened to our relationship.
Pre-Covid, Bae and I proclaimed that we were best friends. While I believe that we believed that, the truth is we weren’t around each other enough to earn the title of “best friends.” If anything, life with him mostly resembled the top six contestants’ experience on an episode of The Bachelor. Meaning we spent minimal IRL time together due to our hectic schedules, so we’d have to meet in various cities around the world in order to see each other, like in 2017, when he surprised me by showing up in Croatia for the end of my movie shoot and then took me to London for my birthday. Uhhhh, yeah, I’m pretty sure I could be besties with anyone who took me on an international trip where we ate amazing food, went to a couple of museums so I could tell my friends that I experienced some cultch aka culture, endured my saying “Fanks” instead of “Thanks” to every sales clerk I encountered because I heard Adele say it that one time at the Grammys, and put us up in a nice hotel so that this $3.49-a-bottle Dial antibacterial soap loyalist could bone near overpriced bottles of Aēsop hand wash. I mean, if you did this for me, I’d be your best friend, your bridesmaid, would fashion you a Coachella flower crown out of the dusty-ass CB2 faux succulents from my apartment, be a character witness at your tax evasion hearing, and whatever else you need. If I’m being completely honest, the majority of my relationship with BB was about almost anything except having to deal with the day in, day out of dating someone. We weren’t spending loads of quality time together, so we minded our p’s and q’s because we didn’t see each other often. We weren’t showing our worst flaws because we wanted every moment to be romantic and magical. So we were lovers. We were FaceTime partners. We were texting buddies. We were travel companions. We were girlfriend and boyfriend who missed each other more than we saw each other. We were friends. But legit best friends? Nah. Quarantine changed all that.
Voluntary confinement with a significant other comes with a choice: take on the Sisyphean task of trying to maintain appearances so a version of you can be loved, even if that love feels unearned, thus perpetuating the cycle of self-doubt you’re so clearly stuck in, even if working to get the kind of rose-colored-glasses Hollywood kind of love you think you want is counterproductive to getting the specific, messy, nuanced, unwavering love you actually need, and shrouding yourself in smoke and mirrors prohibits you from loving your partner completely and truthfully because you’re unable to love yourself completely and truthfully. OR you tell your ego to take a back seat so you can lay yourself bare (in spite of all internal signs pointing toward self-preservation), all for the possibility of a love you’ve never known before.
Now, I’m not implying there is a wrong and right option here. Everyone’s life and capacity to love and be loved, as well as the type of love they desire, varies and is impacted by lived experiences. However, I do believe that if you want a once-in-a-lifetime love, a love that not only withstands the worst parts of what each person brings to the partnership but can only exist if both people bring their best, truest, and sometimes hidden parts of themselves to the relationship, then ya better put it all—the good, bad, and ridiculous—on the table. And as much as I loved being the cool, funny chick he fell for when we met years ago, I knew letting go of that was the only way I could be what I am to him now: his best friend.
Now, some folks don’t want to be best friends with their partner. They’d rather keep a little mystery in the relationship. Wut? You know why there are no Nancy Drew books when she’s a grown-ass woman? Because Nance is tired. She ain’t looking for clues no mo’. She’s probably got a twenty-year fixed mortgage from City National Bank, acid reflux, and rogue hairs growing out the side of her titties (just me?). She’s not about that solving-mysteries life. And neither am I! Life is confusing as it is; the hell you need to be piecing things together about your partner on a corkboard down in a basement? Like you on the grid, got Wi-Fi, some government employee named Darryl (and all of Russia) knows everything about you because of your sosh meeds, but you out here tryna hide from the one heaux, your bae, who will call National Grid on y’all’s behalf because their meter reading led them to upcharging you seven dollars in April. News flash, the significant other who does that is your ride or die! That’s why I don’t understand all these couples out here waltzing around their relationship with a “you can’t know xyz about me.” You’re a team! You think Tom Cruise woulda solved all those impossible missions if Ving Rhames left a bitch on “Read” for a solid two hours because he didn’t want to seem too eager? I. Don’t. Think. So. End the mystery, y’all! Je ne sais quoi? More like Je ne sais nah. Can you tell I barely tried with that one? ANYWAY! Moral of the story: You can be mysterious with anyone. That isn’t special. But showing the authentic you? That’s reserved for the person who’s earned your trust and is interested not in the you up on that pedestal, but in the you that’s down on the ground and in front of their face.
At least that’s what I believe when it comes to Baekoff. Instead of prompting us to leave, showing our true selves made us double down and understand that some of our flaws could be fixed in months or a year, while others are just lifelong issues and quirks that we’ll have to keep in check. It deepened our bond—a best friend bond that is unconcerned about appearances, shame, and embarrassment. In fact, all those things you wouldn’t dare tell another soul are, sometimes, the only things you wanna talk about.
So often, over the weeks after #Poopgate, my boyfriend and I’d be hanging out, cooking, or sleepily asking each other about our roses and thorns of the day even though we knew the answers because we wi
tnessed it all. And no matter how much quarantining tested us and our patience, we always returned to the fact that still, we wanted to share everything. Best friends share everything. So I fessed up and told my bestie about the time I shit myself because I knew how much it would make him laugh. I knew how much the two of us laughing until we choke is absolutely one of my favorite things in the world. I knew how much telling him was the last thing to free me from my ego of who I thought I wanted to and should be around British Baekoff. I knew telling him was going to allow me to fully be with him at home, in our home. He is my home.
Black Girl, Will Travel
In order for me to tell you about the time I tandem swung off a bridge in Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, I must first tell you about the person I jumped with: Mai Huynh. Remember the episode of White Living Single aka Friends when Ross buys a new couch? Instead of having it delivered to his crib, which is nearby, he enlists the help of Rachel and Chandler to carry it up the stairs of his NYC walk-up apartment, then yells “Pivot!” with increasing urgency as Rach barely helps? Sometimes, that’s what it’s like to talk to my friend / director of operations of all my businesses / life coach / part-time therapist / #1 BTS fan, Mai. She’ll stare blankly (At you? Through you? Past you to the immediate future where there’s complete and utter quiet again? Who knows?) as you desperately grasp at anything to talk about: “You like reading books? I love reading books.” Silence. “Eating out at restaurants is tight. Apps and then wet naps. Ya know, to wipe your hands.”
I don’t know about other folks, but her lack of response makes my mind go into a tailspin—Why the fuck did you say that? Bitch, I don’t know! I’m panicking here—until I muster up the courage to break the silence. “Going on walks is . . . something? Um, there are parks. LoOKIng aT LeAVEs is nIce. hAVe you eVeR dOne tHAt?” Sure, it’s funny now, but in the moment, you can feel as though you’re failing the most difficult stress test known to humankind. Like, okay, NASA’s Mark Kelly, you were pushed to your limits during your astronaut aptitude and physical exams, but call me after you’ve done a one-hour car ride to Newark airport with a petite Vietnamese-Belgian woman whose withering glances can cut through your soul like it’s a preteen’s earlobe at a Claire’s ear-piercing station.
To be fair, Mai’s not reserved because she’s playing mind games; she’s quiet because that’s just who she is. She’s like if comedian Tig Notaro and Game of Thrones’ Jaqen H’ghar—minus the killing, of course—had a baby, which is the complete opposite of me. Yet like all seemingly mismatched buddies, our differences make our bond unique. I live to be effusive and loud and can revel in attention. As for Mai? Homegirl is always at a two, has a dry sense of humor, and is unimpressed with most things and people, including my thirsty ass. Deep down, I know Mai has a soft spot for me; but, honestly, she really only gets hyped for K-pop boy bands, snacks, and Hanson. Hanson? YES! That. Hanson. The white boys and their long, flowing flaxen-colored hair that you’d typically find on an Iowan cornfield thot? Yes, that Hanson.
The point is Mai is a chill person who can thrive in solitude, so naturally, she got through quarantine with relative ease and was rewarded greatly by the Universe for her resolve. Her skin became so radiant that the moon has written her name down in its burn book. Her spirit was renewed like the Tidal free-trial subscription I forgot to cancel. Her chesticles said, “Gravity, I rebuke thee,” and lifted five inches. #SorryIsaacNewtNewt. I mean, she was legit in her studio apartment, working hard, wearing cozy PJs, and eating in peace without my nosy ass hovering over her shoulder and asking, “Ooh, what are you eating? Yeah? That sounds good. What’s in it? How do you make that?” and her having to fight every urge to respond with: “BITCH, DO YOU SHOP FOR INGREDIENTS IN KOREATOWN? DO YOU OWN A SPATULA? HAVE YOU EVER READ A RECIPE IN ITS ENTIRETY? THEN STOP ASKING ME ABOUT SHIT YOU WILL NEVER INCORPORATE INTO YOUR LIFE!” Clearly, she has the patience of a saint, which I’m so grateful for.
However—and this is a big, juicy, oversized “however”—on that fateful day in March 2019 when Mai and I, with one arm around each other, stood on the edge of the bridge and stared down at a 230-foot drop over a gorge, I would have liked her to be less “Om” and more “I don’t want to die either!” Turns out, as I learned later, part of the reason she was so unbothered is because without glasses on, her vision is, as the average optometrist would conclude, “mostly trash”; therefore, me, the bridge, the sky, the gorge, and the river were an amalgamation of shapes and colors. So while I was thinking about every single bone in my body breaking, she was experiencing the Disney+ version of tripping balls: none of the hallucinations, but all of the color palette that Bob Ross used to paint sunsets. Great.
Anyway, there we stood, displaying two ends of the emotional spectrum before attempting a death-defying stunt. The two men in charge of this activity gently kept their hands on our backs because surely they’d been down the familiar road of people chickening out at the very last second. I imagine folks who do that tend to fall into one of two camps: relief that they didn’t follow through on doing something so risky OR regret that they didn’t push past their fear for a once-in-a-lifetime experience. To me, it seemed these guys believed I would end up in the latter camp if I didn’t do this, plus I kept delaying the proceedings with cries of “Waitwaitwait! I just need one more second.” Realizing a steady hand wasn’t working, they switched to tough love by reminding me that I was making this situation more difficult than necessary when all I had to do was look not down but straight ahead, then count to three so Mai and I could walk forward off the bridge and enjoy the fall.
Oh, really? That’s all I have to do? Walk off a damn bridge with some ropes tied to me and hope I will survive? This is why white people get eaten by lions or end up on the side of a mountain looking like Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining aka frozen to death because some fool boiled down the dangerous to a simplistic and casual “All you have to do is . . .” and the white people are like, “Great! Let’s pack up the Patagonia and some Clif bars and I’ll meet you there!”
But also . . . as much as I hate to admit it, these men were kind of right. Focusing on all the possible things that could go wrong only raised my anxiety and kept me firmly planted on the bridge. Tough love wasn’t going to alleviate my fears, especially when all I wanted was for my irrational fear to be validated. A simple “You’re right. This is hard. This is scary. But I believe in you. You can do this very hard, scary thing.” Alright, so basically I hoped these guys that I just met twenty minutes ago would be my stand-in boyfriend while they just wanted to low-key shove me off this bridge so they could move on to the next customer. #MenAreFromMarsWomenAreFromVenus. And Mai? Well, she was quiet as a church mouse except for whispering the occasional “It’s going to be okay” to me. This little bit of gentle encouragement was all I needed, apparently, because I eventually gathered myself together. The men started the countdown and on three, I closed my eyes, Mai and I stepped out, and whoosh! down we went. Fast! The drop simultaneously happened in milliseconds and felt as though it lasted minutes. As we screamed, I thought, You idiot! You’re missing the best part. You’re missing everything! Open. Your. Eyes. So I did, and wow! Everything around us was beautiful. We were laughing, whooping. We felt alive and completely out of control. It was exhilarating and a reminder that these once-in-a-lifetime moments can happen only if you travel. So how did Mai and I get here? Glad you asked.
For the past few years, I’ve had the pleasure and opportunity to do philanthropic work with (RED), a nonprofit organization that teams up with various consumer brands to create products and experiences that people can buy. Proceeds from those sales help fund the fight to end AIDS, in part by helping reduce the price of HIV and AIDS medicine so that the people who need it the most can actually afford it. As the powers that be at (RED) know, it’s one thing to study up on information and be a talking head or host events to encourage others to get involved / raise money, but it’s quite another to get out o
n the ground and see the real-life results of everyone’s hard work. So they invited me to join several donors on a trip to Zambia. I immediately said yes and asked Mai if she would like to join me.
See, I’ve always wanted to go to Africa, even long before I got my passport in 2015. The poverty porn that the world was determined to sell about various African countries, as well as the continent as a whole, never sat well with me. The voyeuristic, invasive, and zoo-esque energy always felt like propaganda, as if to say “Look at how uncultured, sad, and unfortunate Africans are. We shall either pity them or ‘marvel’ at their exoticness. We will absorb them as content, but not view or respect them as people. We will ‘save’ them, but only if they can still be dependent on us and never desire to have their own agency.” Despite not having much evidence of the contrary when I was growing up—this was the nineties, after all, long before the internet and social media made it easy for anyone to show what I knew all along to be lies—I was certain that much of what I was told about Africa was far from true. I knew that, like everywhere else in the world, Africa is a complex place that’s rich and overflowing with culture, traditions, stories, communities, and countries that cannot and should not be condensed to a tragic byline in a Eurocentric and falsely superior narrative. And even though I was in Africa for only four days and got to see a very small percentage of the continent, it was enough to change me forever.
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